Space photographer is locked out of his Twitter account after his video of NASA’s Artemis launch is mistaken for PORN – as astronomer reveals her account was banned for an ‘intimate’ video of a meteor
- John Kraus locked out of Twitter after his Artemis launch video mistaken for porn
- Space photographer was accused of violating rules by sharing intimate material
- He had posted an iPhone video of NASA’s Space Launch System blasting to orbit
- It comes after astronomer was locked out after meteor video mistaken for porn
First Twitter banned an astronomer for posting a video of a meteor — now a space photographer has been locked out of his account after his footage of NASA’s Artemis I launch was mistaken for porn.
John Kraus was happily sharing pictures and video of the historic blast-off when he received a notification saying his account had been locked for ‘violating the Twitter rules’.
The Florida-based photographer was told that one of his posts broke the social media giant’s guidelines because he had shared ‘privately produced/distributed intimate media of someone without their express consent’.
Mr Kraus appealed but was told if he deleted the video his account would be unlocked.
His experience emerged just 24 hours after an astronomer claimed she was locked out of her Twitter account for several months over her video of a meteor shower.
She said it was mistaken for explicit content by the site’s moderation bots.
Ban: First Twitter banned an astronomer for posting a video of a meteor — now a space photographer has been locked out of his account (shown) after his footage of NASA’s Artemis launch was mistaken for porn
John Kraus (pictured) was happily sharing pictures and video of the historic blast-off when he received a notification saying his account had been locked for ‘violating the Twitter rules’
Mr Kraus has not yet tweeted about the ban but a separate account @Erdayastronaut, belonging to rocket enthusiast Tim Dodd, detailed what happened (pictured)
HOW COULD ‘CHIEF TWIT’ ELON MUSK CHANGE TWITTER?
- Charge a $20 per month subscription fee for a ‘Blue Tick’
- More adverts
- Relax content restrictions
- Make its algorithms open source
- Ridding spam bots with increased authentication checks
- Cheaper ‘Twitter Blue’ service
- Edit Button for users worldwide
- Bring back Vine and incorporate it with Twitter
Read more here
Mary McIntyre, from Oxfordshire, made a six-second animated video clip of the Perseid meteor shower four months ago but was locked out after it was flagged to have broken rules for containing ‘intimate content without the consent of the participant’.
Her initial 12-hour ban went on for months and she exhausted the online appeals process.
She was told she would only be allowed back on to the platform if she deleted the tweet and ticked a box to acknowledge that she had broken rules.
Ms McIntyre’s account was restored after the BBC highlighted her experience.
MailOnline has approached Mr Kraus for more information about the Twitter ban.
He has not yet tweeted about it but a separate account @Erdayastronaut, belonging to rocket enthusiast Tim Dodd, detailed what happened.
Mr Dodd tweeted yesterday that Mr Kraus had been banned from Twitter on the ‘day of the biggest launch of his career’.
He wrote: ‘I’d like to acknowledge that our good friend and rocket photography extraordinaire @johnkrausphotos has been completely locked out of twitter since yesterday, for an arbitrary and silly reason, the day of the biggest launch of his career.
‘Worst possible timing.’
Mr Dodd added: ‘I know he [Mr Kraus] was excited to share his new images and his new calendar and stuff featuring #Artemis1.
‘So since he can’t, I’m going to. Support his work by shopping around and check out his 2023 calendar (BTW he didn’t ask me to do this, I just feel for him) http://johnkrausphotos.com.’
Mr Kraus and Ms McIntyre’s experiences are just two examples of innocuous tweets that have been flagged as violating Twitter’s rules amid a turbulent time for the social media platform following tech mogul Elon Musk’s takeover.
Mass layoffs in a bid to drive profits has resulted in wiping out the teams that battle misinformation as outsourced moderators learned over the weekend they were out of a job.
Twitter fired its contractors that track hate and other harmful content on Saturday, and some said they were unaware they had been fired — only realising when they were not able to log on to their work systems.
Twitter let go of much of its full-time workforce by email on November 4.
Mary McIntyre, from Oxfordshire, made a six-second animated video clip of the Perseid meteor shower four months ago but was locked out after it was flagged to have broken rules for containing ‘intimate content without the consent of the participant’
Her initial 12-hour ban went on for months and she exhausted the online appeals process
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme, Ms McIntyre said: ‘It’s just crazy. I get a DBS check every year because I do a lot of work with school children and brownies and scouts.
‘I don’t really want it on my record that I have been sharing pornographic material when I haven’t.’
She added: ‘I must have gone through the appeals process as many times as I can.
‘We found an online contact form on the help page, I must have contacted them eight times now, and I just get nothing.’
A conservationist also revealed how he was slapped on the wrist for tweeting about pink-footed geese as they flew over his house earlier this week.
Nick Acheson, who uses Twitter with the moniker @themarshtit, said he ‘almost exclusively’ tweets about nature and was surprised to find his account had been suspended for ‘violating’ the platform’s rules.
Twitter has been approached for a comment about the bans but is yet to respond.
WHAT IS TWITTER’S POLICY ON HATE SPEECH?
Twitter says it does not tolerate behaviour that harasses, intimidates, or uses fear to silence other social network users.
Twitter users that violate these rules could find their content deleted, or their access to the account suspended by the social network.
What does Twitter forbid?
According to the company, it will remove any tweets that do the following —
- Threaten physical violence
- Promote attacks on the basis of their race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease
- References to mass murder, violent events, or specific means of violence in which such groups are the primary targets or victims
- Incites fear about a certain protected group
- Repeated use of non-consensual slurs, epithets, racist and sexist tropes
- Content designed to degrade a specific user
Twitter users can target individuals or specific groups in a number of manners, for example using the @ mention feature, or tagging a photo.
How does Twitter enforce these rules?
According to the company, the first thing it does whenever an account or tweet is flagged as inappropriate is check the context.
Twitter says: ‘some Tweets may seem to be abusive when viewed in isolation, but may not be when viewed in the context of a larger conversation.
‘While we accept reports of violations from anyone, sometimes we also need to hear directly from the target to ensure that we have proper context.’
Twitter says the total number of reports received around an individual post or account does not impact whether or not something will be removed.
However, it could help Twitter prioritise the order in which it looks through flagged tweets and accounts.
What happens if you violate Twitter’s policy?
The consequences for violating our rules will vary depending on the severity of the violation and the person’s previous record of violations, Twitter says.
The penalties range from requesting a user voluntarily remove an offending tweet, to suspending an entire account.
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